BATON ROUGE, LA. (AP) – A modern Louisiana requirement that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public classroom by Jan. 1 was temporarily blocked Tuesday by a federal judge who said the law was “primarily unconstitutional.”
U.S. District Judge John W. deGravelles in Baton Rouge said the law had an “apparently religious” purpose and rejected state officials’ claims that the government could order the establishment of the Ten Commandments because they are the foundations of U.S. law are of historical significance. Its statement noted that no other fundamental documents – including the Constitution or the Bill of Rights – may be made public.
“We strongly disagree with the court’s decision and will immediately appeal,” Louisiana Attorney General Elizabeth Murrill said in an emailed statement. Murrill, a Republican, supported the bill, as did Republican Gov. Jeff Landry.
By issuing an injunction, DeGravelles said opponents of the law will likely win their ongoing lawsuit against the law. The lawsuit argues that the law violates provisions of the First Amendment that prohibit the government from establishing a religion or blocking the free exercise of religion. They had argued that displaying the Ten Commandments in poster size would isolate students, especially those who are not Christians.
DeGravelles said the law amounts to unconstitutional religious government coercion against students: “As plaintiffs point out, parents are required by law to send their minor children to school and ensure that they are present during regular school hours at least 177 days a year.”
Supporters say the measure is not only religious in nature but also has historical significance to the foundations of U.S. law.
The plaintiffs were a group of parents of Louisiana public school children.
The modern law in Louisiana, a reliably Republican state anchored in the Bible Belt, was passed by the state’s Republican-dominated Legislature earlier this year.
The law, touted by Republicans including President-elect Donald Trump, is one of the latest pushes by conservatives to integrate religion into the classroom – from Florida legislation allowing school districts to have volunteer chaplains accompany students advice, to Oklahoma’s top education official ordering public schools to incorporate the Bible into instruction.
In recent years, similar bills requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in classrooms have been proposed in other states, including Texas, Oklahoma and Utah. However, because of the threat of legal disputes over the constitutionality of such measures, none of them came into force.
In 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a similar law in Kentucky was unconstitutional and violated the First Amendment, which states that Congress “shall make no law respecting any religious establishment.” The Supreme Court found that the law had no secular purpose but rather served a clearly religious purpose.
Louisiana law, which applies to all public K-12 schools and state-funded university classrooms, requires that the Ten Commandments be displayed on a poster or framed document with a minimum size of 11 x 14 inches (28 x 36 centimeters). must have the text in central focus and “printed in a large, easy-to-read font.”
Each poster must be accompanied by a four-paragraph “Context Statement” describing how the Ten Commandments “have been an important part of American public education for nearly three centuries.”
Tens of thousands of posters would probably be needed to comply with the modern law. Advocates say schools are not required to spend public money on the posters, but instead can purchase them through donations or have groups and organizations donate the actual posters.
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McGill reported from New Orleans.
